I really hate that we're still having this conversation. While I acknowledge (and lament) that growing biblical illiteracy in our society, it remains an enduring frustration of mine that so many seem to fail so miserably at properly discerning the difference between Christ's moral instruction for His followers to obey and some supposed divine dissertation from the Messiah regarding 21st century economic systems.
Yet it seems like every few weeks someone else with a platform lofts a rhetorical loogie like this:
Honestly, I can't shake the feeling that this nonsense has been thoroughly refuted enough times, the activist who said it shamed enough times, the unbiblical premise revealed enough times, that progressive Christians who continue to peddle it are just doing so to troll.
If that's the case, it's a well-played, expansive troll given the amount of time, money, and effort many of these professing believers put into turning Jesus into a proponent of government redistribution of wealth.
Let's start here: Christianity transcends economic policy. Jesus brought a spiritual kingdom, not a political one. But for Christians we have a responsibility, it would seem, to discourage public policy that increases human suffering. That's why it's confusing to see Mennenga and so many others wearing the name of Christ advocating for it.
Free market capitalism's propensity towards sliding into greed and excess pales in comparison to the economic system they tempt readers to entertain. The heart of socialism is greed. If feeling entitled to the fruits of someone else's labor is not greed, after all, what is it? Yet that (along with a side of envy) is the backbone, the foundation, of socialist economic policy.
Socialism robs an individual of their creativity, their ingenuity, their resourcefulness – in many ways it robs them of their resemblance to their Creator. Unsurprisingly, this has devastating effects not only on a human's soul, but upon the community or culture that is so ordered.
One need not look to the multitude of historical examples for proof of this. Merely visit a Native American reservation to catch a glimpse of what a "democratic socialism" experiment, that is a government planned, government funded, government run community looks like. Given billions of dollars every year to care for the Natives, well-intentioned bureaucrats have spread misery and subjected them to lives of abject poverty.
Yet it gets worse. It always gets worse. When delicately pressed on this point by a follower, Mennenga retreated to Scripture and the example of the early church as justification for his claim.
I don't know how to put it delicately so I'll just say it – in a world that is so keen on mocking and demeaning the intellectual curiosity of Christians, we simply have to be capable of better thinking than this. Here's the passage to which Mennenga references:
Acts 4:33-35
All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And God's grace was so powerfully at work in them all that there were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned land or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone who had need.
Even a peripheral reading of the text reveals that if believers were sharing their possessions, they had possessions to share. That presupposes private property rights. That's reiterated when Luke writes that "from time to time" (meaning not always) some would sell their land or houses, giving the profit to the apostles.
Notice also what was motivating their behavior. God's grace was moving among them so powerfully they were moved towards generosity and self-sacrifice. They were not coughing up possessions for redistribution at the end of the government's gun. Nothing in Acts 4 is consistent with socialist economic policy.
Now, to be sure, I don't believe anyone is unchristian for supporting the Social Security Ponzi scheme. Politically wrong and unwise? Yes, but not unchristian. I don't question the Christianity of anyone who wants to increase Medicaid or the SNAP food stamp systems. I may disagree with them politically, but that isn't tantamount to belittling or abusing the Word of God.
My objection to Mennenga and others is that they convey the unbiblical idea that support of socialist redistribution policies is synonymous with obedience to the call of Christ to care for the "least of these."
If the government takes from me and gives to the poor, I am not fulfilling the command of Jesus to be personally charitable. Similarly, if I am in a position of power in government, and I use the force of law to take from certain citizens and redistribute to other citizens, I am not fulfilling the command of Jesus to be personally charitable.
Anyone who suggests or teaches those things deserves rebuke.
